Sentiment regarding budgets took a steep fall among global marketers, finds Warc [pdf] in its June 2012 Global Marketing Index (GMI). The budget component score of the index fell to 47.3 in June, down from 50.3 in May and 53.7 in April, as marketers’ confidence waned in the face of risks to global economic recovery.
June’s score is the lowest since January, and is the second consecutive month with a decline, following 7 consecutive months of improvement.
Europe Most Skeptical
Marketers from Europe (44.1) demonstrated the most pessimism about budgets, unsurprising given troubles within the Eurozone. Respondents from the Asia-Pacific (47.3) region also limited spend, perhaps in response to concerns over a slowdown in China. Marketers in the Americas are the most optimistic, but even they only kept spending on par with previous levels, with a score of 50. (An index reading of 50 indicates no change, and a reading of over 60 indicates rapid growth.)
Optimism Abates in All Regions
Warc’s headline Global Marketing Index (GMI), which tracks overall industry opinion as a composite of marketing budgets, staffing, and trading conditions, dropped to 52.4 in June, from 55.3 last month. Respondents from both the Americas (53.8) and Asia-Pacific (53.4) recorded improvements, but both were down, from 56.2 and 57.1, respectively.
Marketers in Europe, by contrast, were of neutral sentiment (50), after showing generally improving sentiment (52.5) last month.
Other Findings:
- Global tradition conditions remain positive at 54.1, although that is down from 57.3 in May and 62.1 in April.
- The index of staffing levels is the highest among the 3 components, at 55.7, but also dropped from 58.3 a month earlier.
About the Data: Warc’s global panel (1,295 members) consists of experienced executives working for brand owners, media owners, creative and media agencies and other organisations serving the marketing industry. The panel has been carefully selected to reflect trends in the three main global regions: Americas, Asia Pacific and Europe.
Data collection period: 4-15 June 2012. The Global Marketing Index results are calculated by taking the percentage of respondents that report that the activity has risen (“Increasing”) and adding it to one-half of the percentage that report the activity has not changed (“Unchanged”). Using half of the “Unchanged” percentage effectively measures the bias toward a positive (above 50 points) or negative (below 50 points) index. As an example of calculating a diffusion index, if the response is 40% “Increasing,” 40% “Unchanged,” and 20% “Reducing,” the Diffusion Index would be 60 points (40% + [0.50 x 40%]). A value of 50 indicates “no change” from the previous month.
